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Commentary & Analysis

In timely and incisive analysis, our experts parse the latest development news and devise practical solutions to new and emerging challenges. Our events convene the top thinkers and doers in global development.

We at CGD warmly welcome president-elect Barack Obama's appointments of Timothy Geithner as Secretary of Treasury and Lawrence Summers to head the National Economic Council. Both are members of the CGD Board of Directors. This is no coincidence.

Everyone says August in Washington, D.C. is quiet. That is of course, unless you are planning to attend the presidential conventions and from what I can tell, just about everyone is sending someone to the conventions. And this time around, CGD is going to both of them.

Senators Lugar and Bayh are again on the anticorruption warpath. Yesterday they issued a press release calling for "a Government Accounting Office (GAO) probe of the World Bank's anticorruption efforts." They want to make sure that the U.S.'s $950 million contribution to the International Development Association is not being "misspent and enriching corrupt foreign regimes." Certainly sounds reasonable, but is this really the right focus for a review of World Bank operations?

McNealy arrived late, delayed by a meeting at the Pentagon. You could tell he was tired. He’d flown to DC from California with a stopover in Dallas where he stayed up late watching hockey as his beloved San Jose Sharks fell to the Stars in the 4th overtime. Nonetheless, by the time lunch was finished at 1:30pm we had made good progress answering moderator Lawrence MacDonald’s query – does sharing and openness really matter for development?

Scott McNealy is Chairman of Sun Microsystems a company he co-founded in 1982. He is a fierce competitor in business and in a hockey rink. He can be abrasive and outspoken explaining that "diplomacy has never been my middle name." He is an avowed capitalist and self-proclaimed libertarian. Nonetheless, his bio page says he's a "Champion for Sharing." In fact, Sun, as part of its business strategy shares almost everything. Its Java software platform and Open Office applications suite are open source.

The New York Times yesterday (and Paul Krugman earlier in the week) called on rich countries to "step up to the plate" in confronting the food crisis in developing countries -- in the short run by increasing their donations of food aid. and in the medium run by getting rid of economically inefficient, inequitable, and environmentally unsound subsidies for biofuels, especially corn-based ethanol.

International good citizenship is critical for improving America's security and image in the world, according to Sen. John McCain, the presumed Republican nominee for U.S. president. Citing the growing interdependence of the U.S.

DAKAR, Senegal: Nigeria's anti-corruption chief, whose investigations have ensnared some of the country's wealthiest politicians and officials, will be sent to a year-long training course in a remote police academy, according to senior law enforcement officials in Nigeria, in what many analysts and anti-corruption activists say is an attempt to sideline him.